"Mr. Citizen, Sir, I'm the Lousy Cop you've been talking about!"

This is the season, when I was very small, I would accompany my mother to Stavannah Reservoir to harvest pecans from nearby trees. They are cherished memories now. Hurling a stick at upper branches I could shake loose ripened nuts & then retrieve them from the fragrant crackly autumn leaves.

Recently, visiting with Police Chief Ed Forbest of Stavannah we shared memories. As the son of an early Oklahoma lawman I understand some of the acid heartache of today's lawman. Ed Forbest and I got our heads together..., we decided it's time to interview you!

Mr. Citizen, Sir, I'm the lousy cop you've been talking about.

Mr. Citizen, Sir, your courts let felons go free and you blame me! And then you buy books by the pampered predators and their sleazy lawyers - whose side are you on , Sir?

You accuse me of coddling criminals, until it's your kid I catch. You raise Hell with the guy who cuts you off in traffic, but let me catch you doing the same thing and you threaten to sue! Whose side are you on, Sir?

When some career crook,  twice my size, curses me, spits on me, dares me to stop him, you say, that's part of my job. If I do what I have to to arrest him, you call it brutality! Oh! It's OK with you if I fix a flat tire for your wife or give her enough gas to get home on a dark night or deliver your baby in the backseat of my cruiser or work hours overtime looking for your runaway daughter. But, if I stop for a cup of coffee, I'm a goof-off at taxpayer expense. "Do something about crime you demand!"  And yet if a rapist runs, you tell me, "don't shoot - he's too young!"  And if I shoot anyway, I'm suspended without pay pending a probe that may cost me my badge, and maybe, you'll demand that I be jailed. Sir, whose side are you on?

It's the wife who phones in the family fight and yet, when I get in the middle, she's on his side. I'm expected with my academy education to make life and death decisions in seconds that courts take weeks to decide. If I'm right, I'm lucky; if I'm wrong, I'm dead. I spend sleepless nights on a dry run stakeout, wasted days on redundant paperwork, tedious hours tracing long shot leads to a dead end, and yet, the only time you see me is when you're driving too fast. And then, if I smile, I'm a flirt, and if I don't, I'm a pig. In a chase, my tired Ford is outrun by some crummy junkie's suped-up Mercedes. In the alley I'm outgunned; in the revolving door court room my hand out lawyers are no match for the ones felons can afford. Any one cop on the take splatters his guilt all over the rest of us because, apparently, you want to believe the worst of us.

Mr. Citizen, Sir, do you want to trade jobs?

Sigh----------uhm------I didn’t think you would!

Paul Harvey
28OCT95 Radio Broadcast

Submitted by: Dep.John Adicks
Harris County Constable Pct.5
Houston,Tx

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